QUESTION: I have inherited a cookie jar from my mother's estate, our family home outside Philadelphia. The cookie jar is marked on the bottom “Goldilocks #405 Patent Pending.” I see on the Internet that there are plenty of these jars in the marketplace. However, my cookie jar doesn't look like the one's I found with this mark. The design I have is slightly different. After a bit of research, I wondered if my version is a 'blank' that was simply uniquely printed or perhaps its just a rip off reproduction. I have no clue. Can you help me solve this mystery?ANSWER: What you have is the bottom of a Goldilocks cookie jar and the top of a Little Red Riding Hood cookie jar. The former was made by the Regal China Company and the latter by the Hull Pottery. Goldilocks has a blue hood and a little bear while Little Red Riding Hood has a red hood and a basket of flowers. The tops and bottoms of these cookie jars, though different in design, are interchangeable. What must have happened is that the top of the Goldilocks jar got broken and someone replaced it with the top of a Little Red Riding Hood jar. In antiques, we call this a marriage.
As in real life marriages where both people must work together to form a perfect union, antiques marriages can be either really good or terribly bad.In the world of antiques, marriages are somewhat of a curse, especially when it comes to furniture. Here, a dealer joins together two different pieces of furniture worth significantly less than the original to form one piece that could be worth much more than the original. Novice antiques collectors could easily be fooled into spending more for a married piece than it’s actually worth.
Some unscrupulous antique dealers would no doubt try to pass off a married piece as an original while others marry parts together and literally make antiques. This is especially prevalent in the middle market where profit margins aren’t as high in the fine antiques one. This is especially true of antique furniture from the 17th to the 19th century. However, pieces made during this time often came in sections.
Back then, transporting large pieces of furniture was difficult. Pieces had to be transported in carts, and they had to be light enough that a small team of horses could pull them and two men could lift and carry them. So cabinetmakers produced furniture in pieces so that it could be easily transported and then assembled on site.
Of course, furniture that can be easily assembled is just as easy to disassemble. This meant that the end user could easily replace a broken or worn-out part of a piece of furniture without having to buy a new one. For example, if the table top splintered, the owner could simply keep the base and have a new top made. These combinations of old and new became the first married pieces of furniture.
But how does a novice collector know when a piece is a marriage? The more knowledgeable a collector is, the less chance he or she will have of getting taken.Marriages are often easy to spot. First, look for any clash of styles. Cabinetmakers would not have combined furniture styles since most used style books to help them fashion their pieces. Second, check to see if there are any unusual proportions. Does one part seem larger than it should be? Third, does the wood used to make the piece match. While some cabinetmakers used less expensive wood for the frames, most used better wood for the exterior. Fourth, is the overall finish even. If not, this means parts of the piece have been finished at different times, such as a new table top. And finally, does the hardware match. Unless the owner couldn’t replace drawer and cabinet pulls with the same style, all the hardware on a piece should match.
Unfortunately, antiques marriages are contrived to deceive the buyer. A lot of this goes on in England where the market for antiques is always hot. Visitors especially usually have no idea what they’re buying and usually fall for marriage or even fake antiques.
One of the most common marriages is in 17th and 18th-century secretaries. The bottom desk is often married to a bookcase top from a different secretary. These two pieces may be orphans and when matched often look fairly good together. With the price of 18th-century secretaries in the six figure or more range, it’s no wonder that dealers try this. The easiest way to spot a marriage of this sort is to check the backboards. Those on the top and bottom must match, including nails. The quality of the wood must also be the same.For chests and highboys, comparing a drawer from the top with one from the bottom should reveal the same dovetailing—all of which cabinetmakers did by hand—as well as linings.
Another popular marriage is an antique wrought iron sewing machine base that’s married to an antique table top. While this may look quite fine, it has little value.But antiques marriages aren’t limited to furniture, although that’s where most of them occur. As with this cookie jar, like fitting pieces of ceramics or glassware can be married together. This usually falls into tops for bottoms as well as lids to jars and other containers.
Not so honest antiques dealers can deceive customers in many ways. A newer painting of a scene done in an old style can be mounted in an antique frame, for example, then sold as an antique.
But the most common marriages occur in higher end furniture where a piece that may not have sold for much or not at all is married to one that together forms a different piece that can sell for a whole lot. Don’t be fooled. Do your homework. And ask plenty of questions. The more you ask, the better chance of tripping up an unscrupulous dealer.
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